Patients with acute coronary syndrome, an umbrella term for conditions where the heart's blood supply is suddenly blocked, may be at an increased risk for suicide compared to otherwise healthy people, according to new research ...

Type 1 diabetes patients with elevated albumin in their urine had three times the risk of life-threatening kidney and cardiac disease as those with normal levels, according to researchers at the University of Colorado Anschutz ...

Even modest increases in high blood pressure were linked to a greater risk of death and heart failure among African American adults of all ages, according to new research in Journal of the American Heart Association, the ...

Chronic kidney disease patients who take urate-lowering therapy and achieve target urate levels show improvement in kidney function, according to new research findings presented this week at the 2016 ACR/ARHP Annual Meeting ...

Allopurinol, a widely used treatment for lowering serum urate levels, does not appear to increase risk of kidney deterioration in gout patients with normal or near-normal kidney function, according to new research findings ...

Certain medications commonly used to treat heartburn, acid reflux, and ulcers can have damaging effects on the kidneys. The findings come from two studies that will be presented at ASN Kidney Week 2016 November 15¬-20 at ...

Researchers have discovered a link between constipation and poor kidney health. The findings, which appear in an upcoming issue of the Journal of the American Society of Nephrology (JASN), suggest that the diagnosis and management ...

Coordination of care designed to slow the progression of kidney disease is likely to be cost effective because it prevents the need for dialysis, according to a study that will be presented at ASN Kidney Week 2016 November ...

To improve care for patients with kidney dysfunction, investigators are striving to identify modifiable risk factors that may slow the progression of chronic kidney disease (CKD) to kidney failure. A new study suggests that ...

Chronic kidney disease (CKD), also known as chronic renal disease, is a progressive loss in renal function over a period of months or years. The symptoms of worsening kidney function are unspecific, and might include feeling generally unwell and experiencing a reduced appetite. Often, chronic kidney disease is diagnosed as a result of screening of people known to be at risk of kidney problems, such as those with high blood pressure or diabetes and those with a blood relative with chronic kidney disease. Chronic kidney disease may also be identified when it leads to one of its recognized complications, such as cardiovascular disease, anemia or pericarditis.

Chronic kidney disease is identified by a blood test for creatinine. Higher levels of creatinine indicate a lower glomerular filtration rate and as a result a decreased capability of the kidneys to excrete waste products. Creatinine levels may be normal in the early stages of CKD, and the condition is discovered if urinalysis (testing of a urine sample) shows that the kidney is allowing the loss of protein or red blood cells into the urine. To fully investigate the underlying cause of kidney damage, various forms of medical imaging, blood tests and often renal biopsy (removing a small sample of kidney tissue) are employed to find out if there is a reversible cause for the kidney malfunction. Recent professional guidelines classify the severity of chronic kidney disease in five stages, with stage 1 being the mildest and usually causing few symptoms and stage 5 being a severe illness with poor life expectancy if untreated. Stage 5 CKD is also called established chronic kidney disease and is synonymous with the now outdated terms end-stage renal disease (ESRD), chronic kidney failure (CKF) or chronic renal failure (CRF).

There is no specific treatment unequivocally shown to slow the worsening of chronic kidney disease. If there is an underlying cause to CKD, such as vasculitis, this may be treated directly with treatments aimed to slow the damage. In more advanced stages, treatments may be required for anemia and bone disease. Severe CKD requires one of the forms of renal replacement therapy; this may be a form of dialysis, but ideally constitutes a kidney transplant.

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